The New Zealand tour is now confirmed and I am away from around 15th October until 10th December. That’s about eight weeks of examining in places such as: Christchurch, Dunedin, Timaru, Alexandra, Invercargill, Blenheim and Nelson, which are all on South Island and then Wellington and Hamilton, which are on North Island.

Rather than do individual articles for each examining trip, which is too fiddly, it is easier, both to write and to read, if there is one article to cover all the trips for the year and than to update this articles as the information arrives and updating becomes possible.

The first trip in 2015 is to Ballymena, about 30 miles north of Belfast for the first two weks in March. Since I was also in Northern Ireland last year, the logistics of flying, car hire etc, are now more familiar. The Ballymena trip involves working at the local centre for most of the two weeks and also doing short stints at two of the better local schools, Ballymena Academy and Cambridge House.

Istanbul

After a gap of one week, it’s then down to Nottingham for one week. Exams include a singing diploma and a few drum kit exams as well as the more usual instruments. Being based at a hotel next to the station and usuning the station car park actually works quite well as the exams are dotted about the city, mainly in a couple of local churches, both of which turn out to be nice and warm.

I was originally meant to go to the Middle East in January of this year, but as by the New Year I hadn’t had my 2015 training update, this was postponed until May. There is first a trip to Turkey with exams mainly in Istanbul, but also in Izmir, an hour’s flight to the south.

Then it’s onto the proper Middle East with examining sessions in Abu Dhabi and then Dubai. The whole tour is for five weeks from 28 April until 30 May.

Dubai

There is a short trip to Carlisle towards the end of June and plans for later in the year consist of a major tour to New Zealand in November and December.